What is privacy?

 

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In short, privacy is the state of one's actions being intentionally hidden from some people in such a way that for these people to have information about these actions (or their result) they would need to violate one's property rights.

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For example, let's suppose that Alice sends a sealed letter to Bob. The letter is the result of a particular action by Alice: one that is hidden from people other than Bob in such a way that for these people to have information about its result (i.e. to read what Alice wrote to Bob) they would need to violate Alice's property rights (in this case, by opening the sealed envelope).

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If Alice's letter had been already delivered to Bob, or if it contained information about Bob that he did not want other people to know about, by opening the sealed letter one would be violating also Bob's privacy. Once delivered to Bob, the letter belongs to him.

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As the name suggests, the concept of privacy is therefore ​​strictly and logically connected to the one of property: violating someone's privacy is a form of stealing.

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One implication of this fact is that, if there's no violation of property rights, then there's no violation of privacy. For example, if Alice sends a postcard to Bob and the postman reads it, he is not violating Alice's (or Bob's) privacy because he's not violating their property rights.

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Another implication of privacy being strictly and logically connected to property is that privacy can be defended only as a negative right, not as a positive right. The right to privacy is nothing more than a particular aspect of the right not to be aggressed.